Ritchie plots a stylish ascent for Barnsley in seeking to emulate his friend Boothroyd

Shortly after Andy Ritchie switched on his television to watch last Sunday's Championship play-off final the cameras panned to the tunnel where the teams were waiting for a signal to run out. Barnsley's manager was struck by a marked contrast between the two sets of body language: while the Leeds United players looked decidedly nervous, Liam Miller flinching when a firecracker went off in the stands, their Watford counterparts exuded an air of almost preternatural confidence. Seemingly oblivious to that loud bang, Adrian Boothroyd's men might have had the words "in the zone" stamped on their foreheads.

"They were so psyched up," Ritchie recalled admiringly, before pointing out that "Keith Mincher, who used to be our sports psychologist here, is now employed by Aidy and was working with Watford in Cardiff. We just haven't got the finances to employ a psychologist now but we've tried to keep doing some of the things Keith put in place."

A good friend of Boothroyd, Ritchie is only too aware that victory over Swansea in today's League One play-off final will go a long way to clearing the £5m debt that is a legacy of Barnsley's plunge from brief Premiership grace and the collapse of ITV Digital. Deciding that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, he hopes that the partial recycling of a Boothroyd idea will facilitate Barnsley's return to the Championship.

"Aidy took Watford to the Millennium Stadium in the week before their final for a sort of dress rehearsal and I'm planning to go a little bit down that road too," Ritchie said earlier this week. True to his word, yesterday Barnsley's squad toured the ground, having arrived in Wales on Thursday. "I don't want us to be caught in a rabbit-trapped-in-headlights scenario," he said.

Rarely known to freeze in front of goal, Ritchie was a penalty-area predator who was involved in the very first play-off final when Leeds lost their battle for top-flight status with Charlton in 1987, after two legs and a replay. Having started out at Manchester United, he scored prolifically for Brighton, Leeds and, most notably, Oldham - then flourishing in the top division under Joe Royle. Boothroyd was precisely the sort of lower-league defender that Ritchie delighted in wrong-footing but a firm friendship began when they met on a Lilleshall coaching course.

"We were doing the old FA full licence badge and it must have been at least 15 years ago," recalled Ritchie, now 45. "Aidy was very young, I think he'd just turned 20, but we had a really good laugh and stayed in touch. Watching the Championship play-off was a double-edged sword as Leeds are one of my old clubs but I really wanted Aidy to do well."

Intriguingly these two English managers boast very different football philosophies. While Boothroyd favours route one, Ritchie revealed a purist mind-set as he chatted after a training session featuring much practising of penalties at Oakwell last week. "It'll be a good game against Swansea," he predicted. "Like ourselves, they're a proper footballing side. I've never, as both a player and a manager [he also had a stint in charge of Oldham], wanted to be involved with a team that hit long balls all the time, but Barnsley fans wouldn't let you get away with lumping it anyway.

"When I first arrived I remember Norman Rimington [a one-time Oakwell goalkeeper later destined to perform virtually every backroom job from coach to kitman], who has been here since time immemorial and is very forthright, taking me to one side and saying: 'Don't you dare go playing that long-ball game here.'"

This, after all, is the club where the fans' favourite refrain remains "it's just like watching Brazil". They may lack Ronaldinho but Barnsley do boast Stephen McPhail, the former Leeds and Ireland playmaker. "Stephen has played Champions League and international football," enthused Ritchie. "Macca's the heart of the team: he's very steady like a milkpond, never a raging sea."

Even so, anger was in the Oakwell air and the dressing-room language appreciably less lyrical when Rick Holden, Ritchie's assistant and former Oldham team-mate, recently threw the players' underpants, socks and shoes in the communal bath while they trained.

"They weren't happy but it was deserved," explained Ritchie. "They play a lot of pranks on Rick; they've glued his boots to the floor, cut them up and used 100 feet of Cliniband to tie doors together and cause him considerable consternation. They're pests but they're young and we see a lot of similarities between them and our old Oldham team. We feel we've got the same sort of rapport with this squad we had with Joe Royle."

Nirvana beckons if Barnsley win what Ritchie calls "the biggest game of my managerial career" but the alternative is purgatory. "I saw the hurt on Peter Jackson's face after we beat his Huddersfield team in the semis," he recalled. "I only hope I won't feel the same pain on Saturday."